Objects First With Java: A Practical Introduction Using BluJ

The BlueJ development environment was specifically designed to support introductory teaching of object-orientations and helps users grasp the complicated concepts of class structure. Unlike most books on the subject, this text uses BlueJ to get readers started on object-oriented programming from day one.

Uses a spiral approach that introduces a topic in a simple context early on, then revisits it later to increase understanding; Offers an abundance of projects for hands-on practice; Chapters are ordered around software development concepts rather than language features; Language-feature introduction is naturally driven by problems to be solved; Chapters are based around distinct projects for more variety; Does not cover traditional topics like control structures.

A useful reference for programmers.

David Barnes is a Lecturer in Computer Science at the University of Kent, in Canterbury, England. He has been teaching introductory programming for over 25 years, and has practical experience of a wide range of programming languages. He has been teaching object-oriented programming in Java for over 10 years. David is passionate about the excitement that is inherent in computer science and is actively involved in promoting it as a subject area to high-school children. In addition to computing education, his main research is in the area of software engineering.

Michael Kölling is a Senior Lecturer at the Computing Laboratory, University of Kent, in Canterbury, England. He holds a PhD in computer science from Sydney University, and has worked in Australia, Denmark and the UK. Michael’s research interests are in the areas of object-oriented systems, programming languages, software tools, computing education. He has published numerous papers on object-orientation and computing education topics. Michael is one of the developers of BlueJ and, more recently, the Greenfoot platform.